Volte-Face: Odisha Cong MLA Bowls ‘Bouncer’ Blame At Rival Parties

Bhubaneswar: Backtracking on his earlier allegation, Odisha Congress MLA from Jatni Suresh Routray on Tuesday blamed the deployment of bouncers at the party headquarters here on rival parties (read BJD and BJP).

“None from our party had brought the bouncers to Congress Bhawan. Opposition had sent the bouncers to tarnish our image,” he told the media.

Earlier on Friday, Student Congress activists were denied entry into Congress Bhawan by a group of bouncers. Protesting against the incident, the activists had staged dharna in front of the party headquarters.

A day later, Routray had decried the move to deploy bouncers during the general body meeting at the Congress headquarters. Without naming anyone, he had blamed senior state Congress leaders for the move.

“The party is united in Balianta, Balipatna, Jatin, Khurda and Bhubaneswar and 5,000 people will immediately reach the spot on one call of ours, what will the bouncers do then. There is no place for goons in Congress,” the MLA had said, apparently hinting at an intra-party feud in Odisha Congress.

Routray, however, added that 95 per cent of party workers were behind Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) president Niranjan Patnaik, who was picked by Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, and he had nothing to fear.